


What Could Have Been

by peachypatriarch



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Akiras mind wanders a lot, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, M/M, P5 Universe ending, P5R Universe for the rest, Persona 5: The Royal Spoilers, Sad, Sad shit?, Unhappy Ending, What Ifs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2020-07-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:22:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25297594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachypatriarch/pseuds/peachypatriarch
Summary: As Akira gazed at his ceiling his mind began to wonder.  He thought about many things.  Things that could have been, would have been.  But will never be.
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Amamiya Ren, Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira, Akechi Goro/Persona 5 Protagonist, akira kurusu/goro akechi
Kudos: 12





	What Could Have Been

**Author's Note:**

> hi??? never wrote a p5 fanfic so here we go 
> 
> this is garbage but idc

Akira gazed at his ceiling as he laid back in bed. Morgana was sleeping undisturbed, snoring softly without a care in the world. They had just defeated Yaldabaoth and changed the cognition of the people so Akira should be excited. Shouldn’t he? 

Yet he didn’t feel it. He felt no glory or overwhelming joy from such a great accomplishment. The best way to put it into words is he simply felt numb. Everything moved so fast after taking down Shido and at what cost? He had lost Akechi. Only at the very end did Akechi feel true remorse for his actions and want to better himself.

But he’d never get the chance. No, instead, he gave up his life to save the gang of metaverse users he once swore to bring to justice. He even shot Akira in the end to get such justice. It was all for hidden reasons at that time, but justice for him all the same. Akechi’s mind was diluted and muddled but after meeting Akira it slowly cleared up.

Akira spent every moment he could with Akechi to further their bond and strengthen it to its maximum potential. One of the first times they had ever spent together Akechi ended up spilling about his childhood and how he felt unloved. Then at the very end of his life he stated once again that all he had wanted was to be loved and needed. To Akira’s friends this was the first time they had ever heard such a thing from Akechi, but for Akira he had heard this once before, and only once.

He never quite realized how much he needed Akechi in his life. Never realized how much he loved him. So many things he had never realized until of course it was too late. Nothing could be done. He wonders if Akechi had lived if things would be any different. He’s thought about it so many times. Spotting Akechi alive and on the streets, running over to him to hold him in a tight embrace. Telling him how much he loved him and needed him in his life so he wouldn’t have to ever rely on the empty feeling of being needed from Shido ever again. 

But like most things in Akira’s life it was a fantasy he would never get to live out. He thinks the worst part of all of this is that there’s no one who feels even remotely the same. Not a damn person in the whole world. Akira was the only one who wanted to spend time with Akechi and get closer to him and keep him close, he’s not even sure if Akechi felt the same way he did in the end. Not that that really mattered to Akira. He’d never know anyways. All of the other thieves pushed Akechi to the back of their minds knowing he was up to something. Knowing that interacting with him would never be worth it. Akira could never help himself though, he spent time with Akechi before he joined the Phantom Thieves and he spent time with him while he was a Phantom Thief awaiting his inevitable betrayal.

They had dueled once. One-on-one in the metaverse alone. In the end they had tied and when they had left the metaverse they began talking about the duel, but only briefly. A few more words exchanged between the two before Akechi proceeded to confess his true feelings for Akira. Feelings of hatred. He didn’t want to lose to Akira, he couldn’t, he refused. He hated to lose just as much as the next person but in Akechi’s case it seemed so much more severe. Then Akechi did something Akira hadn’t expected, he had given Akira his glove, more accurately put he threw it at him but had given it to him all the same. He explained to Akira that it was a tradition in the West to throw one’s glove at their desired opponent when demanding a duel. If Akira were to accept the glove that would mean he accepted Akechi’s demand to duel with him again. Akechi then told him to never forget that he would defeat him, though in the end it was the opposite.

Even though Akechi had told Akira how much he hated him he couldn’t help but feel closer to him. He thought about Akechi’s words the whole way from the station home while clutching his glove tightly. Being hated by Akechi wasn’t something that upset him and if he wanted to duel again he most certainly would give him what he wanted, he wasn’t one to disappoint.

He had gotten as close to Akechi as he could before his betrayal. Even after he had shot what he had presumed to be Akira in the head, Akira wasn’t upset. Akechi was on a path that he could not be deterred from. After exposing his true powers in Shido’s Palace Akira and the Phantom thieves fought him and won. Yet to Akira it didn’t feel like a victory, far from it actually. Akechi was given another chance to kill Akira, Shadow Akechi demanded him to kill Akira. 

Akira considered it. Dying for Akechi. If it made him happier in the end then he would have done it. Trading places with Akechi and letting the false shadow kill him in his place, but he didn’t think it would make Akechi any happier in the end. Dying for someone who hates you and loathes your pitiful existence. Akira imagined it would only make Akechi more upset. So when Akechi raised his gun and aimed it at Akira he wasn’t scared, he felt no reason to be. 

It did come as a shock though when Akechi had shot the shadow and then the button instead. Yelling at him and the rest of the Phantom Thieves to leave him be and get out of there. That was when it all clicked for Akira. Akechi was changing, he was recognizing his actions and trying to make amends, and of course this to Akechi had to have been the only way for him to do it. To bite the bullet in return for the rest of the thieves living. But it wasn’t what Akira wanted.

He wanted Akechi with him on this side of the door where he couldn’t be hurt, it would have been so easy to take two steps forward before shooting the button and lowering the wall. Instead, Akechi wanted to pay for his crimes the only way he felt possible, death. Akira hated it. He hated it and hated it and hated it. Even in the end the only thing on his mind was his duel. Enough so that he reminded Akechi, to which he merely chuckled and called him stupid. But it had no bite behind it, no force, no hatred. So the only choice left was to leave him there to die. It was what the others wanted, so it was what he did.

There was nothing he could have done, right? It’s what he told himself over and over. The words held no meaning in his mind and were empty, a way to try and make himself feel better for something that he could never change.

Akechi had told him something once and it had always stuck with him. He told Akira he wished they could have met earlier, that perhaps then they could’ve been more than rivals. They could’ve been friends. Akechi had shut that train of thought down quickly though, stating simply that it was something that would never happen because it was too late. He was right. He really wished he wasn’t.

Akechi was a lot stronger than Akira was. While Akira was stronger in the metaverse physically Akechi had been far stronger than him mentally in the real world. Keeping meaningless thoughts out of his head and only focused on the reality of things. Something Akira felt he could never do, he couldn’t help but imagine a world where he had met Akechi earlier in life. A world where they were friends. A world where maybe they were something more. A world where they were both happy. A world different than the one they had both been placed in. Those words were ones that would never happen. He would be cursed to live in a world where none of those were reality, the only reality he got was one with Akechi dead in it.

He can’t recall how long he’d been thinking this way. Akechi on his mind night after night and all of the things that could have happened, could have been. He shifted his gaze from the ceiling to his hand. He held Akechi’s glove with him even now. It was the only thing Akechi had ever given him. It was also the only thing anyone had ever given to him to mean so much. The other items he had received from his friends were nice but compared to the glove he held firmly in his hands they meant nothing. 

Akira felt Akechi’s glove meant something that could have been but will never be. An unfulfilled promise. The meaning would never change. He thought he’d cry over Akechi’s death and over the glove but he never did. Not once. Instead he just felt tired, empty, numb, and other things he would never be able to put into words.

He wondered if he’d ever get over it. Something that could have been. Perhaps even something that would have been.

He doubted it.


End file.
